


Inferno

by romanticalgirl



Category: Hornblower (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-31
Updated: 2013-03-31
Packaged: 2017-12-07 00:53:14
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 415
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/742194
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/romanticalgirl/pseuds/romanticalgirl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Originally posted 5-29-06</p>
    </blockquote>





	Inferno

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted 5-29-06

Justinian is like a plague, killing everyone on board slowly, stealing their energy, polluting their lungs and their blood. Horatio can feel it moving beneath his skin, black and viscous, clogging the flow through his veins until it’s almost too much trouble to breathe.

It’s like this that Jack Simpson finds him, rotting from the inside out, sitting insolently in Jack’s spot, hoping for a fight, a knife, a chance to die. There is no defiance in his eyes anymore, nothing but the wish for death and the resignation that death is likely to pass him by for a tastier victim.

Jack, fortunately, is not so picky as death.

“Stupid little whelp.” Jack purrs the words like honey, pouring them over Horatio’s skin as he leans over the back of the seat, his breath hot and putrid on Horatio’s neck. “Are you so keen to be on your knees.”

Horatio turns his head, his once bright eyes dulled and hollow. “No secrets I can keep from you, are there, Jack?”

His insolence earns him a sharp jerk on his queue and he’s face to face with Simpson’s flashing eyes and decaying smile. “You think you’re so clever.”

“Cleverer than you, Jack. I got the seat first.”

They are not so disparate in height, but anger fuels Simpson’s hand as he jerks Horatio from the seat, shoving him back against the wall. There is the clatter of wood and the crash of glass, but the acrid smoke doesn’t smell any different from the scent of rot that bleeds from his pores. 

“You want to die, boy?” Jack thrusts him hard against the bulkhead then jerks him forward, slamming him back again, face-first this time. Horatio feels the blossom of pain as his nose breaks, blood staining his last white shirt. He welcomes the pain – closes his eyes and embraces it as Simpson jerks and pulls at his clothes, at his flesh. “I’ll make you want to die.”

He feels nothing else, not the tear of flesh or the spike of penetration. He swallows his own blood and laughs, reveling in the clean copper taste of it as smoke roils through the room, flames dancing through dried wood. The cry goes up, but he can’t hear it past the heavy strain of Jack’s breaths or the roar of the fire.

Flames lick at his flesh, consuming them in a searing rush and he feels the heat in his bones, warming him like the sweet fires of hell.


End file.
